Prior
to the 4th Series GPK (a/k/a OS4 GPK; Original Series) release Original Appalachian
Artworks, Inc. (OAA) brought a suit against the Topps Chewing Gum Company on
March 5th, 1986. The makers of the Cabbage Patch Kids sculptured dolls (that
became a huge marketing success during the early 1980's) alleged that the Garbage
Pail Kids resembled their dolls too closely; among other things, the GPK stickers
constituted copyright infringement, trademark infringement, unfair competition
and dilution; that Topps' GPK were marketed by Topps as an alternative to Diamond's
CPK stickers and Topps' GPK stickers would seriously interfere with the marketability
of CPK products. There does exist talk that Topps was originally turned
down to produce the CPK stickers and the GPK parody stickers were born out of
slight retribution.

Careful of future legal issues Topps ended up changing four names in the later
print runs of the 4th Series Garbage Pail Kids to avoid any further lawsuits
from other complaints; mainly cease and desist letters. The first and
second print runs had the original names: Woody ALAN (movie producer), REESE
Pieces (candy product), CRYSTAL Gale (country singer) and SALVATORE Dolly (famous
painter). The third and fourth print runs were the later releases of the
4th Series and included the four name changes to: Oak KAY, Puzzled PAUL, Ig
LOU and Battered BRAD. A fifth print run was actually released after the initial
production of the 5th Series GPK to meet the supply and demand that the lawsuit
brought onto the growing craze. The print run contains the 25¢ logo with
the purple cloud and white surrounding, and interestingly, the original unchanged
names. This set was manufactured in Canada in which the wrapper states
'Gum made in Canada'.

3. The first series with 4 Different Designed Wrappers (not including
advertisements).

4. The second of two series that have cards with a Pink GPK Header.
Cards 140a Mouth PHIL
and 140b Tooth LES (visit the
1st Series 'Fun Facts & TidBits' section to view
the first pink GPK header phenomenon).

5. The series contains the Light Blue Nameplate ... no light pink
nameplate within the set.

6. The second series to have a drastically Smaller GPK Header.
Cards 143a MELBA Toast and 143b
HY Rye and twin cards 145a DALE
Snail and 145b Crushed SHELLY.
The header doesn't reach the Peel Here arrow and barely reaches the card number.

7. The Completed Puzzle for the 4th Series is sequential with
the 3rd Series set which contained puzzles 'A' and 'B'. However, the green border
puzzle 'C' now contains 21 pieces rather than 18 puzzle pieces as its predecessors
and the character is larger in size. The set downsizes itself to one puzzle
for this release and has two of the same puzzle within the set for card characters
132a Bony TONY and 132b Unzipped
ZACK.

8. The first series to have a cards with the GPK Acronym found
within the artwork. The product parody G.P.Kola found on the bottle of
cards 128a Sloshed JOSH and 128b Low
CAL as well as on the basketball jersey of cards 154a Basket
CASEY and 154b Dribblin' DEREK.

9. The Die-Cuts for cards 142b Hunted
HUNTER and 160b Formalde HEIDI
can be found swapped with the incorrect die-cut for the two cards.

11. The first series to have a card showcasing GPKSticker
Images within the artwork, for Cards 148a Turned-On
TARA and 148b TIFFANY Lamp, but
these stickers are not characters from previous releases or cannot be identified.

12. The first series to have nameplates in two different colors (due
to name changes within the set) for cards 149a REESE
Pieces and 149a Puzzled PAUL
and cards 164b SALVATORE
Dolly and 164b Battered
BRAD. The names in white have been changed to names in black.

13. The artwork for cards 157a LARRY Lips
and 157b Distortin' MORTON contain an aligator
Emblem on the chest of the shirt, this is a parody of the LaCoste
clothing line. The nameplate covers this emblem on the card, but can be seen
in the final artwork (see the Artwork Gallery section above).

ANNOTATED NAMESExplanatory Notations
and Definitions
of the GPK Names

'CLICK'
IMAGE TO VIEW PAGE

1. MarkNewgarden's sketchbook page sample shows several pencil
and ink rough SketchIdeas. For the 4th Series set the bottom
piece became 140a Mouth PHIL and 140b Tooth
LES (the bat moved to the other shoulder; the head off and being
hit idea possibly became the 7th Series card 291a HOMER
Runt and 291b Screwball LEW)
and the top example piece became cards 154a Basket
CASEY and 154b Dribblin' DEREK
(with the same name and the head dribbled on the other side of body).

2. The gruesome final artwork for card characters 137a MAX
Axe and 137b Deadly DUDLEY by
John Pound was inspired by Frank Frazetta's CREEPY #17 cover (pictured
below) released in October of 1967 titled the 'Executioner'. Per Mark Newgarden
"[The artwork] was meant to stand on it's own and wasn't meant to be an
explicit parody but we both knew it well. I was 8 when I bought this off the
newsstand!" Pound titled his concept 'Axe Man' during the development of
the piece; in comparison to Frazetta's artwork (mirror image flipped), the hood
was drawn to be more revealing to show off the CPK facial features, the axe
position and arm stance remained the same and the dagger remains tucked into
a belt (vest removed) with chest hair spilling out; the chopping block was removed
and replaced with a head basket and a token skull remains, along with the blood
dripping from the blade.

3.This Tom
Bunk Unpublished GPK was painted in 1986 and was intended for
the 4th Series set, although the concept seems to have been reworked by artist
John Pound for 3rd Series cards 98a CHARLOTTE Web
and 98b DIDI T and
this piece held back. The original GPK artwork was published in late
2011 for the GPK Flashback 3 set as LOST GPK cards 68a Arach
NED and 68b Web JEB;
A
scan of Bunk's original photograhic slide from the 80's was used with the character
having a bald head; the painting was touched-up later at Topps in the '80s,
in-house, where they added the yellow hair for the final product; which remains
unpublished.

4. Per John Pound's website; the characters
for cards 138a Alien IAN and 138b Outerspace
CHASE had a major Color Variation for the skyline. A color
rough was also created picturing the character within a purple, velvet night
sky instead of the blood, red sky version that was chosen. Topps employer Gary
Gerani created the concept drawing for the Mars Attacks GPK parody and Mark
Newgarden added the sneakers.

5. GPK artist Tom Bunk
had started working on card front artwork during the 3rd Series along with John
Pound, David Burke and Mae Jeon after having completed the backs for the OS1
and OS2 sets. Bunk re-worked the art for seventeen characters for the card backs;
Mark Newgarden and Art Spiegelman rendered the written content for the release.
Pictured below are the final artwork samples for the 'WANTED' card backs for
cards 129a Second Hand ROSE and 129b Trashed
TRACY (Mailman), 145a DALE Snail
and 145b Crushed SHELLY (Bus Driver; notice
the 'packed in like sardines' fish in the background) and 160a Decapitated
HEDY and 160b Formalde HEIDI
(Mechanic) as auctioned by the Topps Vault through an eBay auction.

6.In
1975, Topps released the Wanted Stickers set ... In 1986, Topps released
the 4th Series Garbage Pail Kids and rendered this old artwork for the
card backs, 10 years later. Out of the 42 Wanted Stickers card set, 15 of these
concepts were used in the 4th GPK series and 18 were used in the 3rd GPK series
(see the 3rd Series section for more information). The 4th GPK Rendered
Titles are: 129a/b Mailman (rendered from Postman); 130a/b Librarian; 132a/b
BABY SITTER; 135a/b Chain Smoker; 140a/b
School Nurse; 145a/b Bus Driver; 148a/b Lunch Room Cook (changed from Cafeteria
Cook); 150a/b Big Brother; 153a/b WiseGuy; 158a/b Pet Cat; 159a/b Fat Slob (changed
from Fatso); 160a/b Mechanic; 161a/b Lazy Bones; 165a/b Pet Dog and 166a/b Plumber. The 4th GPK Titles New To The Series
and not used in any Wanted Stickers or Wanted Posters series are 128a/b NERD
and 142a/b Substitute Teacher. Wanted Stickers
titles NotUsed in any GPK series: Disc Jockey; Baby; Maid; Telephone
Operator; Taxi Cab Driver; Door-to-Door Salesman; Butcher; T.V. Repairman and
Policeman.

7.In 1980, Topps released
the Wanted Posters set with sharper artwork and rendered writing from
the 1975 release Wanted Stickers ... In 1986, Topps released the 4th
series Garbage Pail Kids and rendered the work for the card backs, 5
years later. Artist Tom Bunk had started working on the front artwork
for the cards for the 3rd series with John Pound. Tom Bunk also reworked the
art for the card backs and Mark Newgarden rendered the writing. Out of the 24
Wanted Posters set, three of these concepts were used in the 4th Series and
18 were used in the 3rd Series (see the 3rd Series section for more information).
The 4th GPK Rendered Titles are: 130a/b Librarian; 132a/b BABY
SITTER (poster #24 pictured below) and 150a/b Big Brother. WantedPosters titles Not
Used in any GPK series: School Flirt; Butcher and T.V. Repairman.
(WANTED! outlined in yellow, 'For Neglect of Duty' changed
to red, etc., for the poster)

8. In early 1986, artist George Wright sent Topps three pieces of original
Garbage Pail Kids artwork in hopes of joining the rank of freelance artists
working for the Topps Company at that time. In May of that same year -- at the
time of the 4th Series release, the Creative Director at Topps, Len Brown sent
George a Rejection Letter stating no further GPK artists were needed
at that time. Mr. Wright was an avid collector of Topps' Wacky Packages product
and went on to create the cover for Roxanne Toser's "The Beat Goes On"
book that covered 30 years of Wacky Packages in the 1990's and eventually came
full circle and worked for the Topps Company on several ALL-NEW SERIES Wacky
Packages in the 2000's.

9. Tom Bunk's Snowman Kid for the 4th Series cards 158a Meltin'
ELTON, 158b CRYSTAL Gale and
name change 158b Ig LOU had a significant
Nose Job for the final image. The NPD department at Topps requested
that the carrot nose be shortened for the printed card so it looked more like
a CPKid; the artwork was changed within the art department but two final versions
are available (at least in digital format). Once the extended carrot was removed
the snow run-off from the nose was worked into the face of the snowman, the
blue background remains dark with snow added and no second ruddy cheek was added
to the character. The printed card image can be located above within the Fun
Facts & Tidbits section. Pictured below is Tom
Bunk's color rough for the card artwork and the original final artwork image
with the extended carrot nose; along with the final artwork with the shortened
carrot for comparison. It is interesting to point out that the 1986 card version
has not made a reappearance since the resurgence of the GPK franchise. The long-nosed
image was sent by Topps to LTL and Walls 360 in 2010 for character posters and
re-positional, self-adhesive prints, as well as to Abrams in 2012 for the GPK
art book (covering sets 1 through 5); notice the original, curved GPK logo was
able to be used for this project pictured below. The same image also made an
apperance in the 2013 holiday Greeting Cards set sold online by Topps as one
of the card fronts, and a 'card' image on the backside, pictured below, using
the newer GPK banner; notice the character has been brought forward in the image
with a greatly reduced font size for this mock-up.

10. Although packs were not sold in boxes until 1987, in 1986 Uranus
Strikes Cards could be found as complete sets. A parody card set created
by Bob Ting poked fun at the Topps Mars Attacks trading cards. The last card
in the set, card #36 Invasion Synopsis!
whose checklist name is Starry IDA (= starry
eyed) portrays an alien kid who has crawled out of a garbage pail, holding a
Cabbage Patch Kid-looking doll, and blasting its brains out with a laser gun.
In the same year Topps released the 4th Series set that includes a parody of
their own Mars Attacks set for cards 138a Alien IAN
and 138b Outerspace CHASE.

11. Notebooks were used For the
earlier GPK series as miniaturized flowcharts. The art director's notebook
showed how the work of the set was going -- sketches of concept art, which artist
was working on which concept piece, and the stage in which the painting had
been completed. Often, concept pieces were denied and the department tried to
work them into later sets. A list of concept pieces was kept in case pieces
could not be used. The 4th series contained the following ideas which either
replaced denied concept pieces within the set, were saved for a later series,
or never saw the light of day: strapped on car like deer (4th),
Moby Dick, wristwatch (16th), toasted marshmellow on stick, Cleopatra, gargoyle,
grim reaper (3rd), GPK collector with wrappers (6th with stickers), female body
builder (4th), Mars Attacks alien (4th), superhero charging brickwall, Lochness
monster, bigfoot, Samurai, grave-robber, Jack T. Ripper, blob?, trumpet player
blowing out brains (4th; farting), GPK artist, femme vampire (unpublished),
walkman/breakdance, dog catcher, animal experimentation, Scrooge, femme warrior,
Rocky/Rambo (4th), cockroach/scorpion.